Luther Medical President to Leave at End of Year : Resignation: W. Tate Scott says he’ll spend more time with family. Founder of products company will take his place until a successor is named.

W. Tate Scott, president and chief operating officer of Luther Medical Products Inc., said Thursday that he will resign at year’s end.

Ron Luther, chairman and founder of the medical products company, said he will take over Scott’s duties until a successor can be found.

Luther Medical, based in Tustin, makes specialized catheter products, including needles used to insert the intravenous tubes that guard health workers against accidental pricks.

Scott, 39, who took over daily operation of the company from Luther in 1990, is leaving to spend more time with his family and will announce his plans in a few months, a spokesman said. He joined the company in 1987 as director of marketing.

Scott will also resign from Luther’s board of directors and will not be replaced, Luther said. Two other directors, Marshall F. Sparks and Randolph J. Kroenert, have also resigned and will not be replaced, leaving the board with six members, he said.

Luther and a spokesman for Scott denied that the company’s mixed fortunes were a factor in Scott’s decision. The company’s stock, which was trading at $10 a share in March, has since fallen far below that level. In Thursday’s trading on the NASDAQ market, it closed at $3.875 a share, down 38 cents.

“When you have a stock that drops from $10 to $4, you are bound to have (shareholders) who are looking for a sacrificial lamb,” said Larry Butler, senior vice president of Cruttenden & Co., an Irvine investment bank that has handled private placements of Luther stock. “That’s quite a lot of money disappearing into the woodwork.

“But I disagree with them,” Butler said. “Luther would not be where it is today if it weren’t for Tate Scott. The company is well-positioned for the future. The stock has fallen, but they are stronger today.”

Luther credited Scott with securing a licensing agreement for the company’s catheter products with Johnson & Johnson’s Critikon division in Tampa, Fla., and another agreement to supply Pharmacia Deltec, a medical products firm based in St. Paul, Minn., with a splittable needle that comes apart when a catheter is inserted.

The company posted a slight profit of $21,885, or 1 cent a share, on revenue of $1 million for its latest fiscal quarter. For the fiscal year that ended June 30, however, Luther Medical earned $939,337 on sales of $2.8 million. Sales have been flat for the last several years, although company officials say the profitable quarter is a sign that the Pharmacia Deltec deal will boost financial prospects in fiscal 1993.

Luther said he is confident of finding a new president in the near future. “The company has a much better image than it used to have,” he said, “so we are able to get people to look at us.”